The road to Utopia is the road to Hell. — Communism and socialism are the opiates of the intelligentsia. — The left, in its eternal and futile quest for "equality", is more than willing to abolish liberty and sunder fraternity.

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Practical Libertarianism for Americans: Part I

This is a work in progress. I welcome constructive criticisms and suggestions. Please send an e-mail to: libertycorner-at-sbcglobal-dot-net .

I. INTRODUCTION

This essay is an explanation and examination of libertarianism by a libertarian who comes to his “faith” from experience, rather than from the precincts of philosophy or law. Die-hard libertarians will find nothing new here but my particular interpretation of libertarianism. I am writing for neophyte libertarians and curious non-libertarians who seek a practical guide to the origins, principles, and policy implications of libertarianism.

My focus is on American libertarianism because the Constitution of the United States of America holds the promise of liberty. Building on that promise, Americans can strive to perfect liberty in the United States. But the rest of the world isn’t bound by our Constitution, and it is foolish to think that the rest of the world prizes America’s liberty. America’s stance toward the rest of the world should, therefore, be aimed first at preserving the lives and liberty of Americans. We should next strive to promote America’s prosperity through free trade — to the extent that trade doesn’t weaken our defenses. Finally, we should intervene diplomatically and militarily in the affairs of other nations to the extent that such intervention is necessary to preserve the lives, liberty, and prosperity of Americans. And we must be prepared to intervene until that glorious day when the whole world (or any part of it that may threaten us) is bound in — and acts according to — a constitution of liberty. America’s sovereignty and strength is the shield of America’s liberty, imperfect as it may be. The terms of intervention are debatable, the need for it is not.

What is libertarianism, and why should you embrace it? Here is a formal definition of libertarianism, which has disappeared from Wikipedia but survives (for now) at wordIQ.com:

Libertarianism is a political philosophy which advocates individual rights and a limited government. Libertarians believe that individuals should be free to do anything they want, so long as they do not infringe upon what they believe to be the equal rights of others. In this respect they agree with many other modern political ideologies. The difference arises from the definition of “rights”. For libertarians, there are no “positive rights” (such as to food, shelter, or health care), only “negative rights” (such as to not be assaulted, abused or robbed). Libertarians further believe that the only legitimate use of force, whether public or private, is to protect these rights….

Here’s my rendition:

If you are doing no harm to anyone, no one should harm you physically, coerce you, defraud or deceive you, steal from you, or tell you how to live your life. “No one” includes government, except to the extent that government is empowered — by the people — to defend life, liberty, and property through the circumscribed use of police, courts, and armed forces.

Those principles are consistent with the concept of self-ownership: No one can “own” you; therefore, as a matter of principle, you can “own” no one else. You may vest limited power in government to defend your life, liberty, and property — and to tax you just enough to defray the cost of that defense.

Whether or not you subscribe to the abstraction of self-ownership — a concept that I will address later — there are practical reasons to favor libertarianism. Think of yourself as a business. You know that you are good at producing certain things — as a family member, friend, co-worker, employee, or employer — and you know how to go about producing it. What you don’t know, you can learn through education, experience, and the voluntary counsel of family, friends, co-workers, and employers. But you are unique — no one holds the key to what you should produce, how you should produce it, and what you should do with the love, friendship, goodwill, and money you receive from others in return for producing it. If you are left to your own devices — and as long as you don’t harm, coerce, or steal — you will make the best decisions about how to run the “business” of getting on with your life. When everyone is similarly empowered, a not-so-miraculous thing happens: As each person gets on with his or her own “business” of life, each person tends to make choices that others find congenial. As you reward others with what you produce for them, they reward you. If they reward you insufficiently, you can give your “business” to those who will reward you more handsomely.

Some libertarians do not attempt to justify their beliefs in any external sense; they support libertarianism because they desire the maximum degree of liberty possible within their own lives, and see libertarianism as the most effective political philosophy towards this end.

But remember that your liberty is only as secure as the liberty of your neighbors. If you use the law to advance your interests at your neighbors’ expense, your neighbors can do the same thing to you.

I hope that this brief introduction to libertarianism entices you to read the rest of this essay, where I have more to say about the origins, principles, and practical implications of libertarian principles for Americans. (I will have little to say about the many internecine controversies of libertarianism. For a taste of those controversies go here and here, for example, and follow the links.)

As you read what follows, please keep these points in mind:

Equality before the law is a noble ideal, as long as the law serves everyone’s liberty.

Liberty is indivisible; to restrict economic liberty is to restrict social and political liberty.

Prosperity is a concomitant of liberty, not its enemy.

Prosperity isn’t a zero-sum game. Absent corporate welfare and protective regulation (both of which are anti-libertarian), the wealthy get that way not by robbing others but by providing jobs, products, and services for them.

Liberty comes from the people — or the liberty-minded among them — not from the state. Yet, the state — properly governed by the people’s representatives — can serve as a bulwark of liberty.

The American state’s first and foremost obligation is to protect the lives and liberty of American citizens; the Constitution is not a suicide pact.

Finally, there are many paths to libertarianism, as I’ll discuss. But there are libertarian purists who put great stock in following the “right” path. I’m not of that ilk. What matters, in the end, is whether you believe that life would be better with a much smaller, far less intrusive, and far less costly government — one that’s focused on defending your liberty — and whether you act accordingly.

Comments & Correspondence

Now that this blog is in hiatus, I have closed comments on all posts. If you wish to communicate privately, you may e-mail me at the Germanic nickname for Friedrich followed by the last name of the great Austrian economist and Nobel laureate whose first name is Friedrich followed by the 3rd and 4th digits of his birth year followed by the usual typographic symbol followed by the domain and extension for Google’s e-mail service — all run together.

On Liberty and Libertarianism

What is liberty? It is peaceful, willing coexistence and its concomitant: beneficially cooperative behavior.

John Stuart Mill opined that "the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others." But who determines whether an act is harmful or harmless? Acts deemed harmless by an individual are not harmless if they subvert the societal bonds of trust and self-restraint upon which liberty itself depends.

Which is not to say that all social regimes are regimes of liberty. Liberty requires voice -- the freedom to dissent -- and exit -- the freedom to choose one's neighbors and associates. Voice and exit depend, in turn, on the rule of law under a minimal state.

Liberty, because it is a social phenomenon and not an innate condition of humanity, must be won and preserved by an unflinching defense of a polity that fosters liberty through its norms, and the swift and certain administration of justice within that polity. The governments in and of the United States have long since ceased to foster liberty, but most Americans are captives in their own land and have no choice but to strive for the restoration of liberty, or something closer to it.

Who can restore liberty? Certainly not the self-proclaimed libertarians who are fixated on Mill's empty harm principle and align with the left on social norms. Traditional (i.e., Burkean) conservatism fosters the preservation and adherence of beneficial norms (e.g., the last six of the Ten Commandments). Thus, by necessity, the only true libertarianism is found in traditional conservatism. I am a traditional conservative, which makes me a libertarian -- a true one.

Notes about Usage

“State” (with a capital “S”) refers to one of the United States, and “States” refers to two or more of them. “State” and “States,” thus used, are proper nouns because they refer to a unique entity or entities: one or more of the United States, the union of which, under the terms and conditions stated in the Constitution, is the raison d’être for the nation. I reserve the uncapitalized word “state” for a government, or hierarchy of them, which exerts a monopoly of force within its boundaries.

Marriage, in the Western tradition, predates the state and legitimates the union of one man and one woman. As such, it is an institution that is vital to civil society and therefore to the enjoyment of liberty. The recognition of a more-or-less permanent homosexual pairing as a kind of marriage is both ill-advised and illegitimate. Such an arrangement is therefore a “marriage” (in quotation marks) or, more accurately, a homosexual cohabitation contract (HCC).

The words “liberal”, “progressive”, and their variants are usually enclosed in quotation marks (sneer quotes) because they refer to persons and movements whose statist policies are, in fact, destructive of liberty and progress. I sometimes italicize the words, just to reduce visual clutter.

I have reverted to the British style of punctuating in-line quotations, which I followed 40 years ago when I published a weekly newspaper. The British style is to enclose within quotation marks only (a) the punctuation that appears in quoted text or (b) the title of a work (e.g., a blog post) that is usually placed within quotation marks.

I have reverted because of the confusion and unsightliness caused by the American style. It calls for the placement of periods and commas within quotation marks, even if the periods and commas don’t occur in the quoted material or title. Also, if there is a question mark at the end of quoted material, it replaces the comma or period that might otherwise be placed there.

If I had continued to follow American style, I would have ended a sentence in a recent post with this:

What a hodge-podge. There’s no comma between the first two entries, and the sentence ends with an inappropriate question mark. With two titles ending in question marks, there was no way for me to avoid a series in which a comma is lacking. I could have avoided the sentence-ending question mark by recasting the list, but the items are listed chronologically, which is how they should be read.

This not only eliminates the hodge-podge, but is also more logical and accurate. All items are separated by commas, commas aren’t displaced by question marks, and the declarative sentence ends with a period instead of a question mark.